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Atheism and Multiple-Choice Truth (4227)

… And Nothing but the Truth: Atheism and the Audacity of the Catholic Worldview, Part 4

In school, there are two types of tests — objective tests and essay tests. On objective tests, there is a right answer for each question and, typically, no partial credit is given. Either your answers are right or wrong. There is no gray area. Right. Or, wrong. That‘s it.

And, on multiple choice tests, the answer is right there in front of us. We just have to find it.

Well, in life, we face the same choice. If all the possible answers are on a list, we just have to find the right one. And, if the list is comprehensive and the choices are clear and mutually exclusive, we can know with certainty the right answer is there on the list. This goes for the answers to the big questions of life and of living, including questions about God.

For example, let’s look at the origin of the universe. How did all this come to be? Did it happen by accident or did it happen on purpose? Was the universe designed on purpose or was it the result of blind accident, random chance?

With this question, there are only two basic choices. The universe is accidental or the universe is intentional. It is accidentally ordered or it is intentionally ordered. Those are the choices: accidental or intentional. And, these two choices cover all the possibilities. So, one must be right. And, the other must be wrong.

Similarly, we can look at another set of possibilities about the relationship of the universe to time. We can ask if the universe is eternal or finite. Did it always exist? Or, did it have a beginning? On this basic level there are only two choices. Either the universe is eternal or it’s not.

Also, if the universe had a beginning, how did it come into existence? And, was the ordered universe the result of deliberate intent or blind accident? And, who or what brought the universe into existence? These three questions are fundamental to life and foundational to life as we live it.

And, they are crucial questions implicit in questions about God. For while we can answer questions about God through spiritual experience and revelation, through history and tradition, through common human experiences and intuitions, even through logic and reason, for most of the “heralds” of atheism and their followers, these sources of evidence are inadequate, irrelevant or ridiculous.

This is why they harp on the need for demonstrable evidence and why they have such an affinity for science — science as they see it. Not science as it is. And, that is obvious in how they approach the findings of science and their attitude about the future of scientific findings.

First, let’s look at the beginning of the universe. The standard view of the origin of the universe is the “big bang theory.” This theory based on physical evidence and mathematical extrapolations of the universe’s various properties point clearly to the “beginning” of the universe.

From a Catholic point of view this is not a problem because a beginning to the universe is a dogma of our faith. We know the universe started at the beginning of time and at God’s command.

But, for many atheists, this is a problem. It is a problem because a beginning to the universe raises the question of God. So, what do most of them do? They come up with a theory about other universes. Why? Because the universe must be eternal somehow, no matter how much they must stretch human credulity or how much they must stretch the facts. Or, even more importantly, how much they must distort science.

For these atheists know, if we reason backward from one effect to its cause, and we go back far enough, we must confront something eternal, something uncaused. And, when these atheists reason back to the “big bang,” they must find a way to avoid the logical necessity of an uncaused, first cause outside of the physical universe. They must find a way to maintain their belief in only physical things, in materialism.

And, this logical, inescapable necessity for an uncaused cause and the need for a physical reality as the sole explanation for everything compel them to conclude that the physical realm is uncaused. This uncaused universe is what the “multiverse” theory postulates. It claims that a series of other universes, universes beyond investigation, imaginary universes, actually exist. And, we will never be able to acquire demonstrable evidence of either their existence or their nature.

Second, let’s look at the order of the universe. In the science of cosmology, there is a theory outlining something known as the “anthropic principle” that identifies over one hundred physical constants in the universe, whose presence and finely tuned nature, are critical to biological life as we know it. The “anthropic principle” maintains that the slightest change in an exponent to any of these constants would result in a universe without life.

The “tuning” of the universe for biological life and the extent of these many constants appears to indicate an intention, a structured order, even a plan, just as the “big bang’ indicates a beginning. For Catholics, both a beginning to the universe and an intentional order supports the Church’s orthodox view of creation, though also with the force of reason and tradition, as well as science.

But, for these atheists, this tuning must be viewed as accidental despite the clear probability of such data. Not only do they deny the implication of such fine” tuning”, but they use their multiverse hypothesis as a means of explaining the “tuning.” For them such “tuning” indicates the presence of other universes, whose physical constants are not as finely tuned as our universe. And, they must conclude this because they really believe in materialism and the only operative process for change in this view is accident and chance.

Thirdly, what brought our universe into existence? This question is implicit in the two previous questions. The atheists’ answer to this question is that nothing brought the universe into existence. The universe did not come into existence. It always existed. The universe is eternal.

And, they know this because the multiverse explains away the beginning of our universe. And, their absolute blind belief in random chance, not the scientific data, accounts for the other universes that must parallel ours, though they are wholly outside our ability to investigate. So, atheists answer this question as they did the others. The multiverse and random chance ideas explain everything including existence, including the origin of the universe, including the order and tuning of the universe.

Even when evidence continues to accumulate indicating the likelihood of God, they deny these as real possibilities and create alternatives that stretch credulity in order to maintain their conclusions about God. For their real allegiance is to atheism and to the absolute hegemony of the physical world. They follow their preconceived notions and miss their materialist presuppositions altogether. And, it all leaves them closed to open and honest inquiry and dialogue.

For Catholics know faith is part of their faith. We know, but we also believe. We believe what we believe because it is reasonable and grounded in reality, all parts of reality, the physical, the intellectual, the spiritual, the emotional, the moral, the political, the social. But, despite these sources, we know we need to have faith. Though with all these dimensions and data, when we remember them, we do not need all that much faith.

But for these atheists, they have no faith, or so they think. And, many will tell you this. That is because they don’t recognize the bias they have about ways of knowing, such as their misapprehensions about science and its basis in philosophy, reason and mathematics and their latent and implicit materialism.

And, it is this unacknowledged faith and these misperceptions of other ways of knowing with which they must contend. They must acknowledge and come to know the insights that abound in human experience, in life and in living, as well as in science, including its basic assumptions and its inherent limitations.

For we all face life’s crucial questions. And, thankfully the questions are multiple choice ones. Not only are the choices clear, mutually exclusive and exhaustive, but they are there right in front of us. And, our teacher wants us to get it right and has given us permission to use our notes. But, for some of our fellow students who are atheists, they don’t want any help.
They insist the answers can only be found in a very narrow, unrealistic and distorted way. They stubbornly demand that intangible things become tangible, in order to know that they are intangible. Then, and only then will they acknowledge such intangible things. And, because of their bias and blindness and pride, they can’t see the right answers that are right in front of them.

(See Part 1 of the series here, Part 2 here and Part 3 here. Next: Certainty and Silliness.)

Frank Cronin, formerly an avowed atheist, writes from eastern Connecticut. He has a master’s degree in theology from Regent University. His post-master’s studies include Harvard, Columbia and Holy Apostles College and Seminary. He was received into the Catholic Church in 2007.

The original argument was that atheism is incoherent. My comment was and is supremely relevant to this

“I thought that your response must be a cut-and-paste boilerplate job, so I did a Google search for one of your sentences and found that I am not arguing with a person, but with a series of keyboard shortcuts! ...”

The original point of controversy was that you didn’t feel you should have to read four links that said atheism was incoherent. But now you are willing to conduct independent research in order to construct an ad hominem attack? Instead of devoting all this time to a marginally relevant issue ( indeed, something can be a cut and pasted wall of text but still be both relevant and true) couldn’t you have simply read the links provided? Wouldn’t the causes of reason and logic been advanced far more by that than by outing me as a ‘cut and paster’?

“Though, to be fair, a person does seem to have supplied some transitional material and to have inserted my name in the appropriate place….”

On atheism, what logical reason is there to ‘be fair’? What allow your freethinking mind to be shackled by this servile notion of ‘fairness’?

“so I’ll assume that there is a sentient being reading at least parts of my comments…..”

On atheism, you have no reason to assume that at all. If you applied the same degree of skepticism to God as you do to your five senses, you would never even get past the problem of other minds and you would have no choice but to wallow in solipsism. Indeed, under Sam Harris’ world view YOU are not even sentient since consciousness is a mere illusion, the byproduct of the forces of blind pitiless indifference.

“So, with the hope that you will read this comment….”

Again, on atheism there is no logical grounds to hope for anything. So far everything you have said supports the previous commenter’s point that atheism is incoherent.

“.... before leaving to Ctrl+C the arguments of your favorite apologist,....”

But if the arguments devastate your worldview, why reinvent them each time? Certainly we can both agree that efficiency is good.

“Please know that dumping a stack of articles on an opponent is widely considered to be not only rude, but lazy as well. It is usually a sign that the person dumping the articles has gotten in over his or her head…..”

By what objective standard are able to say any of this is true? Or is this the typical atheist trick of stating your subject beliefs as fact? Which of course would be consistent with the fact that in atheism, there are no grounds for even identifying objective truth.

” is attempting to win an argument by offering their opponent a challenge that is too tiresome to meet (at which point the dumper will claim victory by forfeit) or, if the opponent does meet the challenge, the dumper (who has likely never read those articles) can always hope that the dump contains a knock-down argument…”

So being an atheist gives you the clairvoyance to say what my intentions were in ‘dumping’? Wow! This sounds an awful lot like pseduo-intellectual hand waiving to justify ignoring the real issues-pretty much exactly what you did six months ago when the ‘atheism is incoherent’ thesis was presented to you.

“I actually offering to take you up on your ridiculous challenge if you are willing to do nothing more than select one for me to focus on….”

So, you offering the same pseudo-justification for not responding that you did six months ago when originally presented with the ‘atheism is incoherent’ thesis? If you are going to respond, wouldn’t it be a lot more logical to just ... not ... respond? Instead of delivering a combos rant to justify your non-response?

” It is more than your offer deserves….”

Again, you have no objective foundation to say what anything ‘deserves.’ This comment is also incoherent since In a universe ruled by blind pitiless indifference, nothing ‘deserves’ anything!

” but I’m happy to do it.”

So happy, in fact, that you just delivered a multi-paragraph combox rant justifying why you shouldn’t have to do it.

“My offer, unlike yours, is not an attempt to overwhelm you; it’s not an attempt to shift the burden elsewhere; it’s simply an attempt to keep this debate an honest one.”

What universe are you typing in here? You have a seriously deluded vision of the relevance if this discussion, to the point of apparently having unilaterally drawn up formal rules of procedure which, apparently, I must accept or forfeit. Again, something to be expected for a worldview that is incoherent.

” I ask you to do is point to one of those article. If you think those articles worthy of offering to me, then they should be of individual attention.”

This is sophomoric beyond all comprehension. You’re either going to read them or not, I don’t really care at this point. But the original commenter obviously thought they were worthy or he wouldn’t have included. Your desire to justify willful ingorance is by this point palpable.

” But I’m not going to start in on this if you can’t even stan by any one of them individually.”

So your atheistic time is just so valuable that you cannot be burdened with reading four articles, but you will lower yourself to read one, but only having spending all this time ranting about it. That is, for lack of a better term ... INCOHERENT.

**comment edited**

Posted by Eric Dutton on Thursday, Oct 31, 2013 5:57 PM (EDT):

Given the only glancing relevance of your comment to mine, I thought that your response must be a cut-and-paste boilerplate job, so I did a Google search for one of your sentences and found that I am not arguing with a person, but with a series of keyboard shortcuts! Though, to be fair, a person does seem to have supplied some transitional material and to have inserted my name in the appropriate place, so I’ll assume that there is a sentient being reading at least parts of my comments. So, with the hope that you will read this comment all the way through before leaving to Ctrl+C the arguments of your favorite apologist, I make this plea:
Please know that dumping a stack of articles on an opponent is widely considered to be not only rude, but lazy as well. It is usually a sign that the person dumping the articles has gotten in over his or her head and is attempting to win an argument by offering their opponent a challenge that is too tiresome to meet (at which point the dumper will claim victory by forfeit) or, if the opponent does meet the challenge, the dumper (who has likely never read those articles) can always hope that the dump contains a knock-down argument somewhere.
The usual and appropriate response to such an amateur move is to dismiss the dumper outright or to attack the sources. I am actually offering to take you up on your ridiculous challenge if you are willing to do nothing more than select one for me to focus on. It is more than your offer deserves, but I’m happy to do it.
My offer, unlike yours, is not an attempt to overwhelm you; it’s not an attempt to shift the burden elsewhere; it’s simply an attempt to keep this debate an honest one. All I ask you to do is point to one of those article. If you think those articles worthy of offering to me, then they should be worthy of individual attention. But I’m not going to start in on this if you can’t even stand by any one of them individually.

Posted by Mike on Wednesday, Oct 30, 2013 11:16 PM (EDT):

Wow, Eric, your stubborn refusal to read or even think about theistic concepts has really opened my eyes. I mean, this is mind blowing stuff. You make some powerful points, except ... let’s put the Hitchens-Dawkins Kool-Aid down for a while and look at reality: Kalaam Cosmological Argument, the Argument from Reason, Fine Tuning of Universal Constants, irreducible biological complexity, the argument from morality…. Your entire world view lies shattered at your feet. If you truly honor the gods of reason and critical thinking half as much as you claim, you would plant your face firmly into your hand, step away from the device, find a quiet place, and rethink your life. Indeed, why are you even bothering to comment at all? No atheistic position can be taken seriously until two threshold questions can coherently be answered. 1. Why is the atheist even engaging in the debate. On atheism, there is no objective basis for even ascertaining truth; there is no immaterial aspect to consciousness and all mental states are material. Therefore, everyone who ever lived and ever will live could be wrong about a thing. By what standard would that ever be ascertained on atheism? Also if atheism is true, there is no objective meaning to existence and no objective standard by which the ‘rational’ world view of atheism is more desirable, morally or otherwise, to the ‘irrational’ beliefs of religion. Ridding the world of the scourge of religion, so that humanity can ‘progress’ or outgrow it, is not a legitimate response to this because on atheism, there is no reason to expect humanity to progress or grow. We are a historical accident that should fully expect to be destroyed by the next asteriod, pandemic, or fascist atheist with a nuke. In short, if atheism is correct, there is no benefit, either on an individual or societal level, to knowing this or to spreading such ‘knowledge.’ 2. Related to this, why is the atheist debater even alive to participate. If there is no heaven, no hell, no afterlife at all, only an incredibly window of blind pitiless indifference, then the agony of struggling to exist, seeing loved ones die, and then dying yourself can never be outweighed by any benefit to existing. As rude as it way sound (and I AM NOT advocating suicide) the atheist should have a coherent explanation for why they chose to continue existing. Failure to adequately address these threshold questions should result in summary rejection of the neckbeard’s position.
In the end, we all know you can’t answer these questions because yours is a petty, trivial, localized, earth bound philosophy, unworthy of the universe.
Finally, is there a basement dwelling troll left in the multiverse who doesn’t drag themselves out of the primordial ooze and logged onto this site in order to announce our collective atheism towards Thor, that gardens can be beautiful without fairies (a powerful rebuttal to fairy apologetics, by the way, but it leaves a lot unanswered about the Gardener), and that we cling to Bronze Age skymen due to our fear of the dark?

Posted by Eric Dutton on Friday, Apr 5, 2013 11:34 AM (EDT):

So tell me which of those articles you posted will do the best job of shattering my world view, and I’ll respond thoroughly.

Perhaps you misread my last comment. Or perhaps you’re not up to the challenge.

Posted by Tripp McNeely on Thursday, Apr 4, 2013 10:50 AM (EDT):

Eric, you’ve spent more time explaining why you will not consider an opposing viewpoint than it would take you to actually read and consider it. Your series of evasive, blathering, and assine “responses” (which are not really responsive to anything) demonstrate that your atheism is not founded on anything that passes for reason or logic. If you are truly guided by logic and reason as you claim, you now have no choice at this point but too step away from the computer, find a quiet place, and rethink your life.
So again, you have proven that atheism is incoherent.

Posted by Eric Dutton on Tuesday, Apr 2, 2013 5:53 PM (EDT):

Tell you what, let’s make this interesting. If you tell me which of those four articles you linked to does the best job of showing atheism to be incoherent, I’ll read it and respond here. If I have time, I’ll even summarize the article before I respond. Maybe I’ll give you one to read afterwards.
So, which one of those articles would you like me to read?

Posted by Eric Dutton on Tuesday, Apr 2, 2013 5:44 PM (EDT):

Your posted four links but only provided one thesis. If the theses of all four articles are simply “atheism is incoherent,” then it would, no doubt, be a waste of my time.
Would it be arrogance for you to refuse to read four essays that I posted without any description except to say that they disprove God? I have read a lot of essays that claim to prove that atheism is self-contradictory, incoherent, or otherwise illogical, and they are all so deeply flaw that I wonder how they got published. They don’t challenge my lack of belief because they are so easily dismissed. Now you have posted four more articles that claim to do the same thing, and which I am supposed to read but which you won’t even properly introduce. No thank you. I’m not afraid of these article any more than I am afraid of going to church this Sunday. I’ve been there plenty of times before. I know what to expect, and I know it will be merely annoying without even being of much interest.
Maybe I’m wrong. But at least give me a reason to think they might be different from the stack of other articles with similar claims that I’ve read. You aren’t engaging in honest debate. You’re just giving me pointless homework.
You claim that I’ve already made up my mind. I have, I suppose, but only to the extent that I’ve made up my mind about other unprovable/undisprovable but highly unlikely ideas and not to the extent that I wouldn’t change it if I encountered something convincing enough. I take no pride in certainty, and I don’t claim certainty about God’s non-existence. I only claim that I am unconvinced of God’s existence, and so I shall not live as though he exists. And I haven’t made up my mind about those articles, only about the likelihood (based on experience with very similar situations) that they will be worth my time. I’m perfectly willing to listen to opposing viewpoints. I wouldn’t be here otherwise, would I?

“once your position is shown to be irrational, it is logical to seek a psychological explanation for why you are advancing it.”

I suppose it would be, but I’m still waiting for my position to be shown to be irrational. I have seen many attempts to prove it, but none that succeeded.

Posted by Eric Dutton on Tuesday, Apr 2, 2013 12:22 PM (EDT):

Posting a comment after six months is evidence of militancy?
“You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”
I apologize if quoting The Princess Bride 27 years after it was released makes me sound like a militant film fan. I promise I’m not armed.

Posted by Mike on Tuesday, Apr 2, 2013 12:06 PM (EDT):

“Actually, that would be a red herring.”

Not really, because once your position is shown to be irrational, it is logical to seek a psychological explanation for why you are advancing it.

Posted by Mike on Tuesday, Apr 2, 2013 11:59 AM (EDT):

“Perhaps you can provide a summary, because if they were really any good, I think I would have heard of them by now. If they’re the same old junk, I’d rather not waste our time. Seriously, give me the thesis of each of these four articles. If you expect me to read them, you can type four more sentences to convince me they’re worth my time.”

Eric, here’s the thesis: atheism is incoherent. The fact that you think I need to convince you that they are worth your time is a shining example of neckbearded arrogance. Your comment regarding “the same old” junk further betrays your bias. You have already made up your mind and you admittely have not even read them. If you were truly motivated by truth and logic, I wouldn’t need to convince you to hear an opposing viewpoint.

Posted by Mike on Tuesday, Apr 2, 2013 11:55 AM (EDT):

“To speculate on my motivation for posting here is just that - speculation.”
Kent, the fact that you came back here after a 6 month hiatus to address this comment is pretty powerful evidence of your motivation,and your militancy.

Posted by Kent on Tuesday, Apr 2, 2013 8:51 AM (EDT):

Militant atheism? You don’t see secularists killing physicians or blowing up buildings. To speculate on my motivation for posting here is just that - speculation.

Posted by Eric Dutton on Monday, Apr 1, 2013 11:18 PM (EDT):

“In order to consider your position rationally, we must first ask what you, Louise, Rilke’s Granddaughter, and Eric Dutton are even doing here.”

Actually, that would be a red herring.

“There is an increasing level of desperation that is reflected in this practice of coming onto to explicitly Christian websites and trying to evangelize. It is one thing to put your view out there as a philosophical perspective, but if reason and progress is truly on your side, what need is there to go on the offensive?”

This isn’t evangelism. This article at the top of this page is written about us. This series of articles is spreading bad idea about us, but since the conclusions are ones that lots of people already want to believe, they are likely to spread even if the assumptions are wrong and the arguments are weak. Doesn’t this sound like the kind of situation where it’s reasonable to stand in opposition to an idea? It isn’t convenient to have the people you’re talking about show up, but it is to be expected. If wrote a post about how theist morality is actually a relinquishing of morality for authority, I would expect that theists who read it would probably have something to say about it. It wouldn’t be weird for them to do so. I wouldn’t wonder why they’re really here. That’s just what happens when you criticize others, especially when you do it poorly. Why should it work any other way?
It’s not desperation; it’s conviction.

“Won’t the ‘truth’ lead people to your side eventually, if what you believe is true?”

The truth doesn’t do anything. If truth lead people anywhere, we wouldn’t need teachers.

“The real reason, I suspect, for this militancy is that atheism is, when carried to its logical conclusion, incoherent.”

That’s a very silly assumption. By the way, it’s very poor etiquette to post a pile of links like that, as if your opponent has to either read them or stand down. Why do you think those essays can do what you aren’t able to do (or what this series of dim essays wasn’t able to do)? Perhaps you can provide a summary, because if they were really any good, I think I would have heard of them by now. If they’re the same old junk, I’d rather not waste our time.

Seriously, give me the thesis of each of these four articles. If you expect me to read them, you can type four more sentences to convince me they’re worth my time.

“From a Catholic point of view this is not a problem because a beginning to the universe is a dogma of our faith.” The author tips his hand in this statement. Being dogmatic in one’s faith means that no amount of evidence will alter those beliefs. That is the definition of delusion.

Posted by Eric Dutton on Sunday, Oct 16, 2011 2:57 AM (EDT):

Bruce,
We’ve all heard stories like the one you linked to. They aren’t persuasive unless you already believe. And they are not evidence of a deity. Yes, there are plenty more example. But they all show exactly the same thing: Christians experiencing exactly the same things that every other demographic experiences, but the Christian attributes it to God.
Show me a good study that shows that Christians’ babies suffer fewer complications than atheists’ babies and I’ll be interested.

Since science doesn’t deal in “proof” or “faith”, your concerns are misplaced. And what hard or visible evidence of your deity can you offer? Every faith makes much the same claims. Apparently they are all correct - though they all contradict each other

Posted by Louise on Wednesday, Sep 28, 2011 5:19 PM (EDT):

It’s interesting how you point out how atheists rely on “faith” (in theories like the “Big Bang” or “Multiverse” neither of which can be proved) as much if not more so than Catholics. Seems to me that we have more hard or visible evidence for our faith/beliefs than they do…. and that’s all they consider viable proof… confusing, or maybe “irrational” as you previously named it??!!

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